


The Fold

by elena_stidham



Series: Memory: The Stain of Red [2]
Category: Banana Fish (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Ash Lynx Needs A Hug, Grief/Mourning, Loss, Other, Past Character Death, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Recovery, Sequel, Song Lyrics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-08
Updated: 2019-08-08
Packaged: 2020-08-11 22:55:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,067
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20161471
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elena_stidham/pseuds/elena_stidham
Summary: alders breathing, keepin, weepin.leaves all sinking, fever dreaming.//A direct sequel to "Forever Again," which follows Ash's recovery and trauma surrounding the girl he loved at the age of fourteen.





	The Fold

**Author's Note:**

> WARNINGS FOR: Language, violence, mentions of death, suggestive sexual content
> 
> SONGS USED TO GET IN THE MOOD: My Recovery playlist, specifically “The Fold” by Wickerbird and for the ending scene “Rejoice” from the movie Split
> 
> https://open.spotify.com/user/twijill/playlist/08UcNbQJ83tKPdZnp57XY6?si=82g1GpSVQsGwoJaWzKKEdA
> 
> I wrote this as a direct sequel to “Forever Again,” so if you haven’t read that, please do because this contains spoilers! Canon…but spoilers! This also ties in heavily with my original story, Memory: Pulse Project, and I can’t wait I can’t wait I can’t WAIT to get that started for you guys. I’m going to take a small hiatus after this, since I move into my apartment on the 16th and I have a lot to do that I want to get uncovered and a lot to adjust to and a lot to work on sooooo yeah. Small much needed break lmao
> 
> Anyways! I wanted to write a small little drabble showing the aftermath of Jesse’s death on Ash with some heavy Shorter and Ash angst. If this seems very rushed I’m sorry – because it was, lmao. I wrote it all out in one day. Anyways! I hope it’s still enjoyable nonetheless. 
> 
> My twitter and tumblr is elenastidham. Thank you so much for reading, and I hope you enjoy!
> 
> -Elena

_and when you wake, you'll wake in the mornin _   
_ your fingers cold_   
_ your fields to be sown_

She’s still got grey eyes. They’re still heavy. They’re still full of light.

Ash can’t stop staring at them, he can’t stop staring at _her. _She’s wearing a pretty blouse they found at a thrift shop – covered in flowers that resemble the colours of flames. She’s going to be the death of him, one day. She’s absolutely going to be why he dies.

They’re taking a nap in a meadow – somewhere outside of New York City. At one point he’s opened his eyes and he’s turned to face her, he doesn’t remember when, but he does now that know he can’t take his eyes off her. He rests his head in the palm of his hand while he lays between the flowers beneath the trees. He watches her breathe.

He watches her stir, he watchers her eyes flutter, he watches her sigh.

_“Aslan.”_

His heart jumps for her again. His hand reaches over, caressing her cheek while he whispers to her and mumbles through her name. His heart was stolen by then, and it only belonged to her. He closes his eyes, relishing in the touch of her skin, that way she’d feel beneath his fingertips – the way she was so at ease with him. She whispers again.

_“He’s going to kill me.”_

Ash’s eyes dart open, and instantly the meadow is no longer by him, the girl he loved no longer beside him. He calls for her desperately, panicking as he stumbles onto his feet and looks around. She’s not there. He never was there.

He screams her name, desperately scanning his eyes around in a circle, before suddenly feels the ground shatter beneath of him. And now he’s drowning, he’s plummeting into the dark waters with nothing at all for him to see. It’s just black. Darkness floods through him and around him everywhere, and he can’t breathe until suddenly rays of light beam into the water.

It’s there where Ash looks and finds that there’s a body he can vividly see. One he can remember. Her black hair was still the same, dancing in the Hudson River in a way that almost takes a life of its own. Parts of her body still bleeds. Parts of her eyes still see. She’s still wearing the blouse he bought her.

Ash’s eyes are hot and he screams, bubbles flowing out of his throat and polluted water strangles him down his mouth and around his waist. He reaches for her, struggling to swim, but the water overtakes her – it overtakes them both – and darkness is all he knows.

When Ash wakes up, he’s screaming. Shorter is trying to calm him still while his body heaves and hot tears stain either side of his cheeks. It’s been this way. This isn’t at all the first time.

It’s been seven months since Jesse Stayt had died in Aslan’s arms. Golzine had thought she was his girlfriend, he wanted to destroy her family and keep his slave by his side. So he killed her. He wound up an extended Stayt, and had her murdered right in front of him – beaten to death and stabbed behind her chest. It’s been seven months. Seven months since Jesse died. Seven months since Aslan broke into cries.

This is normal for them. This is an every night routine, but they’re trying to move on. Shorter has to talk him down, like he always does, he has to tell him over and over that it’s going to be okay and that they’re going to be alright. He can’t let Ash plummet into this spiral. He can’t let him get caught in a terror like this.

“I need you to breathe, Ash, I need you to breathe,” Shorter hushes him quietly, holding tightly while he struggles and screams through his broken up sobs. He has Ash’s head pressed tightly to his chest and holds him still from there, his other arm reaching across and holding tightly onto his arm by his elbow. It’s everything he can do to keep him down. “You’re okay. Everything’s okay. I’m right here.”

“Jesse,” Ash calls finally, his body finally starting to relax as the sobs battle through his blood like a car crash at thirty miles per hour. Shorter’s hand grazes up from his arm now, petting Ash’s face while his head is still held still. He doesn’t even realise he’s being rocked.

Shorter just shushes him again, not wanting to speak out loud that she died. He feels eyes at the end of their bed, and he checks, noticing for a brief moment her eyes. It was like something out of a horror movie – her body drenched in blood yet her eyes stay the same. She was just _standing _there, innocently smiling, as if nothing was wrong with her at all. It reminds him of Carrie White.

He looks away in a panic, trying not to audibly pant before he looks back and see now that there’s nobody there. He stares for just a moment, not realising what he was doing in the first place. It’s not until he hears whimpers and sobs again when he turns back to Ash, who had just resorted to crying into Shorter’s lap.

Shorter lets him cry there, petting his growing hair back behind his hears like it was before he had left for training. It’s how he remembers him. He remember seeing his face entirely when he would fall apart.

Now, it’s like there’s nobody there. It’s like he’s abandoned all trace of who he once was, growing into a more monstrous version of himself. It’s like the devil’s eyes had overtaken him. It’s like his name never was Aslan.

Yet despite it all Aslan still appears in the middle of the night, through tears and broken dreams and tattered heartache. Aslan is still here, crying into Shorter’s lap, sobbing motionless until morning. It’s like he was Aslan all along, only abandoned when the daylight comes.

Then daylight comes – he is just Ash again.

_feeble today, just like the seedlins _   
_ asleep in the fold_   
_ but one day you'll grow_

It was supposed to be a good day.

So far it has been. They’ve been drinking and laughing and using the television as noise in the background. Ash is almost invisible here. All Shorter can see is the remnants of Aslan.

They hardly remember what they’re talking about when there’s a knock at the door. Shorter’s the one that checks it first, then he opens it – it’s a Chinese girl from Shorter’s gang. Ash has to think for a moment before he remembers her name. Xue. Xue Zhang. He doesn’t remember how she got involved, he wants to say she was dating someone that used to be involved, but he knows now that her specialty involves keeping an eye on someone. She can investigate and uncover so much without ever being caught.

They’re speaking in Chinese, but not the kind he’d hear Shorter speak with Nadia. He’s a lot more confident when he speaks to his sister, but while talking to Xue he stutters. He’s forgetting words. It must be regional.

She tells him something, and Shorter suddenly falls quiet. He waits, like he’s debating, before he finally lets her in and sits down beside her.

“Apparently you asked her for something,” Shorter says, looking straight at Ash like a parent about to discipline a child. “She found it out. I’m going to translate.”

That’s right. He did remember asking her for a favour – she and her partner were going to visit Chicago for a few nights about a week ago for some business affairs, and he asked them to take a look at Detroit if they had time. Suddenly he’s scared. Suddenly he doesn’t want to know the answer. Even still, Ash nods anyway, inviting whatever she has to say.

Xue begins to speak, and Shorter, reluctantly, begins to translate.

“Apparently, several months ago the Stayt family uprooted to Tokyo,” he explains. He makes sure to listen carefully, and he’s hating everything he’s hearing. He’s hating the sudden look in Ash’s eyes when he speaks of that name. “The father had taken his wife and two daughters and fled there because he was terrified of their safety.”

He remembers her talking about having a sister. He doesn’t remember anything about her saying she had another. Why Tokyo, of all places? What kind of safe haven is offered there? Ash takes a deep breath, trying to think of how to respond to this, but she speaks onward anyway. Shorter has to translate.

“Detroit is falling apart. Someone else took over the family and now they hold all the power and they’re absolutely destroying the city.”

Ash’s blood runs cold. He has to hold his breath, now, before finally he looks at Shorter, then at Xue. He has to hold his tone, but he manages to form a question. “Do you know the name of the new head of the Stayt family?”

Shorter translates this, and Xue has to think. She stares down at the ground for a minute, before she nods and looks back up at Ash. She speaks clear to him now. No language barriers are set up for names.

“Orochi.”

The first thing he hears is the distant sobbing of a girl he loved echoing across these apartment walls. Then he hears her shattering silence when he carves the knife up her back after beating her to death. He hears Shorter saying something to her – and based on her hasty exit, probably that she needed to leave – and then he hears the door close. Then he hears nothing. Nothing at all.

Shorter waits a small amount of time, before he finally turns and takes a deep breath, watching Aslan disintegrate. Watching him turn into Ash. He swallows, then finally uses his voice. “We’re not going to Detroit,” he says simply. He likes to pretend he can’t read the situation like an open book, like he doesn’t have a _rough _idea of what Ash is like, and he has to remember most of all to wade through this water with extreme caution. He can’t let him do anything reckless and stupid. It will get them all killed.

Then again, Ash isn’t afraid to die.

“_You’re _not,” Ash corrects, his hands visibly shaking. He’s bouncing his leg frantically, now, avoiding looking anywhere except at this very particular corner of the sofa. “I have to do something about Orochi.”

“Your best chance to kill him would have been when he wasn’t armed to the teeth while he was here with…her.” Shorter has to be blunt with him, but also careful not to say her name. He has to set things straight. But he knows one wrong slip will end in a disaster of all sorts. Ash clenches his hands into fists. “We can’t go to Detroit, Ash.” He just shrugs, making the mistake of saying his thoughts out loud. “Just let it destroy itself.”

In that exact instant, the coffee table is flipped over as Ash rises to a stand. He’s panting, now, adrenaline coursing through his veins at a velocity Shorter _knows _can’t be matched in a situation like this. Ash is yelling, now. He’s _screaming. _“_She _was supposed to lead the family! The Stayt family belonged to _Jesse, _and he _killed _her for it!” It’s terrifying how violent his eyes have become. “That fucker doesn’t deserve _anything _other than to be beaten down, to where he’s _dead, _and _cold, _with _no blood in his veins! _He deserves to die the same exact way he killed her, but no, he’s being rewarded, and you’re _encouraging _it!”

“Don’t fucking put words in my mouth, Ash,” Shorter scowls at him.

“Don’t fucking tell me what to do!” Ash screams. He grabs a coaster off the ground and throws it at the wall. The picture frame it hits shatters and topples over, crashing into a million more pieces once it hits the floor. _That’s _what Shorter forgot to ask Nadia for the other day – shatterproof glass picture frames. He forgot that since _she_ died they have fights like this, and so many things have been broken off the walls.

“I’m going to fucking kill him, Shorter,” Ash growls particularly through his name. He steps closer, a little too close, the devil’s eyes piercing with rage. “Get the fuck out of my way. This should have been done a long time ago.”

“Maybe kill Golzine first,” Shorter cackles. He reaches over and grips tightly onto Ash’s arms, making sure he doesn’t go anywhere. “Considering _he _ordered the hit, and you’d be much better off if he was dead instead of some random _pawn _he used that’s all the way over in Detroit.”

Ash is hardly listening anymore, just trying to wrench himself away while he yells and violently flails himself around to get out of the way. He kicks Shorter, and manages to break free. This time, he’s a lot more angry, grabbing the bat hanging above the television mantle and taking it directly into the kitchen.

“Like hell,” Shorter grunts, following him there. Before the first swing he’s grabbing onto Ash’s wrists, scuffling with him now, and prying the baseball bat away. That’s fine. Ash just uses his hand and breaks the first thing he gets his hands on – a stack of plates.

Shorter has to lift him off the ground and force him out, walking a few steps over and throwing him into the bedroom like he’s a doll. He lands on the bed, and he’s dazed there for a moment, before he gets back up and sprints back at Shorter. This time, he’s spun around and slammed against the wall. “You need to knock it _off, _Ash!” Shorter raises his voice, his patience running slim. “You’re acting like a fucking _child!_”

Well, they’re both children, really, but they’ve had to grow up in such a way they’re finding themselves stuck in their thirties. They don’t really keep constant track of how old they are much anymore, but it’s something that they’re still vaguely aware of.

“So what, you’re just expecting me to let this shit _go?_” Ash spits. “Especially after who he is? Especially after what he’s fucking _done_? Need I remind you that he _killed her, _then he stole her family name! He _stole _it!”

“I’m not saying let it go, Ash, I’m telling you to not do anything fucking _stupid._”

He goes to fight out of Shorter’s grasp again, but now he finds himself pinned to the ground, with his friend sitting right on top of him to prevent him from going anywhere. He just yells, over and over again, trying to be louder, but Shorter isn’t having it. He just sits there with his arms cross and unmoving while Ash struggles and fails to get him off.

He’s used to the nightmares. He’s used to this, too.

With nowhere to go, Ash is stuck with a raw throat and he’s panting, growing weak under a body that suddenly feels like it’s suffocating him. Shorter waits a little while past this when he knows the last surge of adrenaline is gone from his body before he finally rolls of and lays right by his side. He lets out a breath. “Are you done, now?”

Ash doesn’t want to speak out of spite, but he’s tired. He’s absolutely exhausted. “Yeah, I’m done.”

The silence collected here is shared, pieces of glass are still clinking together as they fall from the kitchen cupboard and onto the floor. That’s going to be hell to clean up. It’s _all _going to be hell to clean up.

Nobody says anything until Ash does, finally, and he’s very clearly so desperate to avoid the subject at hand. “I didn’t know you spoke Two Chinese.”

Shorter sighs something, now, something about this _fucking stupid ass white boy, _is all Ash can make out of it, before he turns his head to look at him. “I spoke what, now?”

“When you were talking to Xue. It was different from the Chinese you speak with Nadia sometimes,” Ash comments.

He hums, knowing what he’s talking about now. “I speak Cantonese with Nadia,” Shorter explains. “What I spoke with Xue was Mandarin. They’re different dialects.”

“Are they similar?”

Shorter chuckles, shaking his head. “Not really.”

“Why?”

He scoffs, shrugging his shoulders. “Fuck if I know. Ask a Hongkonger to speak with someone from Beijing. They will be co-piloting the struggle bus.”

Ash looks at him. “So are you guys from Beijing?”

Shorter shakes his head. “Hong Kong. Xue’s the one from Beijing.” He chuckles lightly. “I really have to work on my Mandarin. I can ask Nadia to help me, she’s _much _more proficient in it than me.”

“I see.”

It’s the closest Shorter gets to an apology these days. When Ash finally retreats from his chaos they find a different subject, before they wait and eventually clean the mess in silence. It’s how it’s been. It’s what he’s gotten used to seeing.

Silence befalls on them once again, but this time, with a lighter atmosphere. He can feel Ash consistently trying to think, before finally giving up all together. He whispers something, out loud, but after hearing these words, Shorter knows he wasn’t supposed to hear them at all. He knows they belonged to someone else. He knows there’s still a deeply hollow pain in his heart.

“I’m sorry, Jesse,” Ash had whispered quietly. “I didn’t want you to see me like this.”

_alders breathing, keepin, weepin. _   
_ leaves all sinking, fever dreaming._   
_ brothers sleepin, wolves all creepin_   
_ weavers weavin_   
_ nothin_

It comes in waves, Shorter notices. It’s either nothing, or it’s all at once. That’s grief, he had to conclude one night, but that doesn’t mean it’s something he _likes. _Especially since it’s taking over Ash like a fucking storm.

What the hell were they doing? That’s right. Getting food.

They were in search for a relatively cheap hot dog joint that’s probably somewhere around the corner when Shorter suddenly notices Ash isn’t under his umbrella. He turns and looks back out into the crowd and notices Ash standing there, in the middle of the rain, staring behind them.

The fuck is he looking at?

“What are you doing?” Shorter asks, walking up to him. Ash doesn’t respond, he just continues staring onward, before he breaks into a sprint. “Hey!”

Shorter runs after him, collapsing his umbrella and not giving a damn about the rain, now. He’s calling for Ash and chasing after him until he realises what Ash has been running at. He has to stop, swallowing hard, and he watches as Ash continues to run.

Ash catches up to her, now. His mind is racing, his heart absolutely pounding as he turns around the girl and cuts her off, but his hopeful smile falters down. Same hair. Same blouse. Different face.

“May I help you?” The girl chuckles awkwardly.

Ash has to force himself to shake his head, working his damnedest to stop the tears in his eyes. Granted, it would blend with the rain if he let them go, but he didn’t feel the rain to begin with anymore. “Sorry,” Ash confesses quietly. “I just thought you were someone I knew.”

She waves it off with a smile, and she walks onwards, wishing him a good day. He has to remember what the blouse actually looks like. Dirty and bloody and a giant gash in the backside because of Orochi. He has to remember that. He has to remember the night she died, because she’s _gone, _Ash. She will never be in this life. Not now. Not ever. Not ever again.

He turns back around and notices Shorter now, before just pursing his lips. He doesn’t say anything about it. “Let’s get you some food,” he says quietly. “I’m not in the mood to eat but I’m sure you’re starving.”

Shorter just slowly shakes his head. “Lost my appetite.”

The rain doesn’t start to pour any lighter. The sky only seems to grow a few shades darker, and Shorter looks up. He doesn’t believe in God, but he prays something up now, wishing to go back in time and switch things up, to make things different.

He wishes it were him instead.

_and what you take, you'll take it for storin _   
_ the bitter snow_   
_ the winter you know_

Sharing beds was something they started doing because Ash had asked him to. He didn’t elaborate as to why, but it was something Shorter was more than alright with. Sharing a bed, even without the romantic subtext, is extremely intimate and sacred, so to have even just a sliver of that with Ash meant everything was going right.

But then, there were nights like this.

It’s an average night where he’s trying to sleep and Ash comes home late. Ash kicks off his shoes and his jeans before slumping into the bed, and there’s a moment where nothing happens – until things do. Shorter feels hands caress up his shoulders to turn him over onto his back.

Ash straddles his hips and leans down to kiss him, softly, quietly, gentle and full of a tenderness he’s not expected from Ash before. He doesn’t taste any alcohol, and he groans. Something isn’t sitting right, but he tastes _fine_, so what’s the fuck up?

Shorter cracks open his eyes, and the first thing he notices is Ash’s hoodie with DETROIT marked with white bold letters across the chest from side to side. He looks up and sees nothing but pain behind those gemstone eyes. He’s forcing himself. He’s trying not to cry.

“Ash, don’t do this,” Shorter tells him quietly, and Ash just shakes his head. The broken voice he replies with wavers like he’s singing.

“Just let me forget for once.”

Ash scoots backwards some before sliding down Shorter’s boxers, allowing his hands to take over from there. He’s hesitant with his mouth, like he doesn’t know what to do with it for just a moment, before he decides to bring his lips back and caress it along Shorter’s cheek and lips like they’re petals on a flower. He’s lost in his movements. Like he wanted to do this with someone else.

There’s kisses on the neck again, and Shorter maybe allows a hickey, but he can’t help but feel like he’s violating Ash. Hickeys are the most symbolic form of teenage youth, but in this case Shorter feels like he’s shadowing a forbidden fruit, like a mark of the beast. He doesn’t want them. He doesn’t want this.

The arousal is _much _harder to hide in this case when there’s direct touch and reaction, but still Shorter has to do everything he can to raise his hands and take Ash by his face. Ash assumes by this gesture he wants to kiss him, so he leans in again. That does _not _help, especially with what his hands are doing – and the last thing he wants is to finish. He doesn’t _deserve _to finish, considering the circumstance, considering the person by chance.

He pries his face away, and finally, grabbing Ash by the shoulders and flipping him over onto his back, he gets him off of his body. He pulls up his boxers again, breathing heavily before looking back at Ash who’s expecting him to do something. This is fucked. This is so fucked. His whole sense of reality is just _fucked. _There’s no simple way to go about it.

“You don’t have to reciprocate,” Ash tells him calmly.

“No, Ash.”

Ash props himself on one elbow and with his other hand he pulls Shorter down so he can bring his lips to his neck again. Once he has a steady grip, he pulls himself off his elbow, relying his entire weight dangling like a koala around Shorter’s neck and shoulders as he breathes heavy kisses up and down his neck and along his face.

“Ash, please,” Shorter groans quietly, bringing a hand up to tug at the boy underneath him. He has to withhold a shudder. He has to withhold everything. “Ash. _Stop._”

And he stops, as soon as he was told to. He remembers every time he begged for someone to stop and they continued to force themselves over him. He remembers every no and plea falling on deaf ears while he’s ignored and pinned down into a mattress. He sees Shorter, with trembling hands, asking him to let go.

His hands withdraw back to his sides and Ash lays down, now, looking up at Shorter over top of him with wide eyes. This is what he’s done. This is what he’s become.

“We can’t do this now,” Shorter’s voice breaks through silence. It breaks through walls. “Not like this. _Not like this_.”

Ash doesn’t even realise the tears spilling from his eyes and flowing through either sides of his cheeks. “I’m sorry,” Ash breathes. “I’m so sorry.”

Shorter only breathes out in relief, resting on top of Ash’s body, almost like an embrace without arms anywhere except at their sides. Ash’s sobs grow a little more prominent, but they’re still in deathly silence. It’s not only once when Ash would have to pour his heart out, but it is a reminder.

For the first time in a long time, Ash thanks him. He thanks him for stopping. He thanks him for sticking with him. He thanks him for staying by his side.

This just prompts Shorter to lift his head, smiling lightly while staring directly into his eyes. It’s a promise of forever. It’s a promise he plans to abide by. There’s no need for thanks. There’s no need for promise. But even still, they’re spoken out into the world and atmosphere anyway.

“Until the day I die.”

_feeble today, just like the seedlins _   
_ sleepin in the fold_   
_ but one day you'll grow_

He finally finished Romeo and Juliet that morning. Despite the spoiler, he still found himself shaking as he cried – and it wasn’t at all because of the play.

“You need to let her go, Ash,” Shorter tells him finally, noticing these tears so early on in the morning. “She’s gone. You’ve been holding onto her for too long. Let her rest. Let her sleep. Let _yourself _rest. Please.”

They eat in silence the rest of the morning.

By the afternoon Ash finds himself walking along 5th Avenue. He doesn’t know why the wind brought him here, but he does know what _is _here. He does know what lies for him on the other side. Maybe that’s what he needs. Maybe that’s what’s best for him.

He learned pretty easily that there was nobody in the Royal Suite, so it wasn’t hard to break into. The fucked up thing is a part of him still expects her to be here. He still anticipates hearing her voice on the other side. He still feels her ghost, as if she’s decided to stick around for another week.

He swallows hard, too afraid to even step over the doorframe line, but he does. He forces his feet onward, and he moves forward, into the bedroom – into the suite.

He has to move on. He has to let her go. She has to _go. _

He is not Ash here – he is a scared and lonely boy. He is Aslan. There is no other name he could go by around these walls. And it’s while he’s Aslan is when he’s the most scared, it’s while he’s Aslan that he’s at his most vulnerable. It’s while he’s Aslan when he’s genuinely exhausted and he’s miserable and desperately crawling out of this life.

“Hey, Jesse,” he says, quietly, finally. His eyes stung. His throat is sore. “It’s me.”

Aslan steps around, feeling for her, telling goodbye to every corner and portion of each room, as if he was here just the night before. He opens the door to her room – it’s been cleaned, now. Everything is fully repaired and there’s no trace of any terror left behind. Out the window, the blinds are open, and in the distance he can see a small group of black birds flying across the skyline towards a new home to set up their case.

There was one room he had been avoiding this whole time, one room he was dreading since he first walked in. But he had to visit it. He had to say goodbye.

Aslan finds himself frozen in the library, unable to form words. His fingers graze along the bookshelves and feeling the spines they used to stare at during their long talks or would attempt to read together during her late night study sessions. He has to say goodbye to this. He has to say goodbye to all of it.

But he doesn’t know what to do. He will never know what to do.

_alders breathing, keepin, weepin. _   
_ leaves all sinking, fever dreaming._   
_ brothers sleepin, wolves all creepin_   
_ weavers weavin_   
_ nothin_

Right before Ash slips into his deepest sleeps, he slips into the fold. The memories that replay right before his dreams sometimes form dreams of their own, and sometimes they carry over. Sometimes they don’t. Sometimes it’s a mixture of both.

He sees her, here. He sees her happy. He sees her smiling. He sees her living a new life, somewhere far, far, away, sharing her joy with someone else. He doesn’t catch his name, but he does catch her not knowing her own name. There’s her heaven. There’s her saving grace. There’s the life she never got the chance to live, the life she’s always wanted to lead – and now she has it, school uniforms and everything.

The fold begins to crease, and he’s slipping into a dream. He’s seeing her change. He’s saying her name.

The world falls dark, then it’s light again. It’s like a complete reset. She looks a little older when she speaks with him, now, but he looks a little older, too – their hair has grown and their eyes have changed with the times. Perhaps this is what she would look like if she were still alive. She’s wearing the blouse. There’s no wear and tear.

They’re in a meadow again. She asks to take a nap.

Every night, he would agree. He would just walk up and lay down beside her in the meadow fields until the daylight shifts and they’re devoured in water. But he doesn’t, tonight. Tonight he just waits. Tonight, _he’s _in weight. The weight comes from the tears in his eyes, if he had to guess. Or the lack of heartbeat.

“I miss you,” he says, finally.

Her face shifts. The reality isn’t changing, but from this face alone he knows there’s going to be a better outcome than before. She smiles sadly at him, opening her arms. “I want to tell you something.”

Ash is careful when he walks to her, shedding off piece by piece of himself until he only arrives as Aslan, through the field of purple and yellow flowers and a perfect green mound. He steps in front of her and waits, before finally joins her, enveloped in her arms and remembering the way she feels in his, too.

“I’m so sorry, Aslan. I don’t remember your name,” she says, almost like a confession. What does she mean by this? She said his name, still. How could she not remember that? Perhaps it’s something cryptid he’ll know once he joins her in the afterlife. Perhaps it’s a hidden message he has yet to receive. But she isn’t done. She hasn’t finished speaking to him yet. “I love you, too.”

Aslan has realised in this exact moment he never gave her the chance to say it back to him while she was still alive. It’s that alone that kills him in this instant, but he can’t let himself crumble apart just yet. He has something he has to do. “I have to let go of you.”

She squeezes, just a little tighter, then her grip loosens just as much. It’s like she knows. It’s like she understands. She doesn’t even have to see his face to know he’s crying, and he doesn’t have to look at hers to know that she is, too. “Promise me you’ll fly.”

“I promise,” Aslan smiles with a breathy sob. “I promise.”

She’s calm about this. She’s calm about his release, before her grip is almost to none. He knows that once they let go, he’s going to wake up. He doesn’t know if he’s ready yet. He doesn’t want to forget.

“We never did get to say goodbye,” Aslan cries. This one’s audible. This one hurts more than the past few months of this new life. He doesn’t want to let her go.

She just chuckles once, taking a deep breath before collecting her thoughts. There’s a million things she can tell him, there’s a million things she wants to say. There’s a million ways she could go but she only has one, and says it very close, very carefully, out loud.

“It’s not a goodbye. It’s a see you later,” she tells him. “I’ll see you soon.”

This can mean a million different things. Even still, it sparks a small chuckle out of Aslan, before he just nods to himself about this and breathes. This is getting very hard. “I’ll see you soon,” he repeats.

“Now _fly._”

She lets go, and Aslan closes his eyes. He opens them again in the bedroom, sitting up on Shorter’s bed, now, not even realising that he still cries. He brings his fingers up to his face and notices the wet marks, now, and he just lets himself cry these tears of relief. They are needed. They are broken. They are healing.

When Shorter wakes up and finds him like this, immediately he’s sitting up and worried, trying to figure out what’s wrong. Aslan doesn’t tell him anything, instead he just leaps onto him and wraps him up in a hug, squeezing tightly with his arms while he just lets out his sobs. There were no nightmares. There was no screaming.

“I won’t let her die in vain,” Aslan promises, finally. “I promise her that. I promise that I’m going to get us out of here. I’m going to fly. _We’re _going to fly.”

It takes Shorter a minute to realise that _he _was included in we. Not her. She’s let him go, and he’s let her go. They’re mutually growing wings. The next goal is just for Shorter to grow his, too.

When Aslan lets go and pulls away now, he looks like an angel. A fragmented, weeping angel, whose wings are made of stone. His heart is heavy, but it’s also light. Relief does that, it seems. That doesn’t mean that he likes it, but it does mean that it’s there.

It’s raining outside. Yet the black birds fly anyway. One decides to turn its way over, resting for just a moment on the windowsill and it’s while Aslan looks out the window and sees that bird when he speaks to her one last time, knowing that she’s not that distant, knowing that she can hear.

“Fly, Jesse,” he says. “I promise. I’ll start flying. I’ll see you soon, but now it’s your turn.” He breathes deeply. “_Fly._”

He doesn’t know when their lives will meet again – if they’ll even get the chance to meet again at all – but Aslan is sure of this. He knows that he’ll never be able to forget her, and he knows a part of him will always love her, but he knows he can’t hold onto her forever. He had found his forever. But he will find his forever again, no matter who that may be.

The bird cocks its head, then it flies away.

On the other side of the world, a girl wakes up in Tokyo. She watches a bird, careful and lightweight, land on her windowsill. She doesn’t think anything of it. She has other concerns at this particular time – she woke up dreaming about…something. She doesn’t remember. She doesn’t know. She feels something from her eyes, and her fingers brush against her cheeks.

Why was she crying?

_alders breathing, keepin, weepin. _   
_ leaves all sinking, fever dreaming._   
_ brothers sleepin, wolves all creepin_   
_ weavers weavin_   
_ nothin_


End file.
